Repeatedly
by Mad Server
Summary: Back from hell, "rehymenated" Dean doesn't have the immunities he once did, and gets sick over and over again, causing Sam to frown and feel his forehead a lot. Written for a prompt from spn hurtcomfort on LJ.
1. Chapter 1

Title: Repeatedly  
Author: Mad Server  
A/N: Written for spn_hurtcomfort. Unbeta'd (eep). Prompt: after hell, Dean's "rehymenated" body doesn't have the immunities Dean had built up, and he gets sick again and again and has his forehead felt a lot. ...See how I had to take it?  
Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural.

---

Sam wakes up to the squeak of the bathroom door, and a blast of light that quickly fades. He frowns as a dream about fish-heads and bridges evaporates around him. The red neon numbers on the alarm clock say it's 2:32am. He sighs, rolls over.

A couple of thumps from the bathroom, then there's the sound of retching, of stomach contents hitting toilet water. Sam grimaces. He's not that surprised; Dean had been looking pretty shitty all day, although of course he'd flat-out denied there'd been a problem.

The toilet flushes, and then things go quiet. Sam lies still and listens. He hears faint, muffled dialogue seeping through the thin walls; he can make out the bright, chipper tone of a commercial, or a very zealous documentary. He waits. No running water from the bathroom, no movement. He starts to wonder.

He calls Dean's name, the blankets still warm around him. No answer. He forces his eyes to stay open so he doesn't fall asleep.

At 2:50, there's still no sign of life in the bathroom. Rubbing his eyes, Sam extracts himself from the bed, and stumbles toward the slit of white light radiating from the mostly-closed door. He knocks softly. "You OK in there?" He waits just long enough for the lack of an answer to become officially disconcerting, then pushes the door inward.

Dean's kneeling on the dirty beige tiles, his body thrown forward as though in deep prayer. His forehead is touching the ground, and his palms are cradling his belly, elbows jutting out. His T-shirt's soaked through with sweat in a couple of places, and his skin is utterly devoid of color.

Sam winces. "You sick?" he asks gently, although the answer is obvious.

Dean rotates his head against the floor, just enough to squint vaguely in Sam's direction with one eye. "S'OK, Sam," he rasps.

Sam snorts. "Isn't that my line?"

"Mmmmhh."

Sam crouches down next to him. "You about finished in here?"

Dean swallows, makes a face, and sighs. A violent shiver jolts through him.

"Yeah," Sam says. "Come on."

He hooks Dean around the chest and slowly pulls him upright despite a feeble grunt of protest, brings Dean with him as he climbs to his feet. The heat coming off Dean is unbelievable, and on his feet he teeters like nobody's business. The shudders multiply as more air comes in contact with his sweaty skin.

Sam shifts around beside Dean and helps him rinse his mouth out, never letting go, then carefully walks his owlishly blinking furnace of a brother back to bed.

Stomach flu. He's laid up for four days.

---

It's a week later, and Dean's color and appetite are making a shaky comeback. He and Sam are driving up the California coast, with the ocean on one side and farmland on the other.

They're just passing a pumpkin patch, when Dean sneezes in the passenger's seat. Six times.

"Wow," says Sam, glancing at Dean as he pants, red-faced. "Impressive."

"Thagks," Dean says, pinching his nose between thumb and knuckle as though to ward off another sneeze. It doesn't work.

"Uh-_CHHHkgghh! AAASH-CHghk! ..._Ugh."

One eye still on the road, Sam steals a long enough look at Dean to note the exhausted slump to his shoulders, the dark circles under his eyes that have suddenly become more pronounced.

"Are you getting sick again?"

"What? Doe." A few hasty swipes at his nose with his fingers, then Dean's digging through their takeout bag from lunch, producing a small stack of napkins. He blows his nose. Thor would be proud.

"OK," says Sam.

By the time they stop for the night, Dean's walking stiffly, no doubt sore all over. He's gone through all the napkins more times than Sam wants to think about, as well as both of his sleeves and (despite Sam's objections) his shirtfront. A roiling, crackling cough has bubbled up, along with a painful-sounding hoarseness in his voice.

"You sound like ass," Sam says as he gingerly drops the bag of snot-drenched napkins into the wastebasket in the motel bathroom. Dean's sitting on the edge of one of the beds, snuffling and blinking slowly at the carpet. He's got his boots off, but is apparently not ready to part with his jacket yet.

"Want me to try and find a drug store?"

Nothing. Sam goes to him and puts a roll of toilet paper into his hands. Dean jumps a little, fingers forming around the toilet paper, glassy eyes locking onto Sam's. "Huh?"

Sam presses his hand against Dean's temple, and frowns. "Drugs. I'm gonna go grab some."

Dean turns and sneezes into his palm. He sniffles, pats his pockets, and then notices the toilet paper. Looking faintly puzzled, he winds some around his hand, breaks it off. "What happedd to Just Say Doe?"

"It forgot about penicillin."

Influenza. He spends two days flat on his ass. The cough drags on for weeks.

---

TBC


	2. Chapter 2

_A/N: This might be really medically inaccurate. You might need to suspend your disbelief. Like, extra._

* * *

The following Thursday finds them in a library basement in Salt Lake City. They're trying to make sense of a case in which three ghosts appear to be working together.

Dean's spent two hours in front of the microfiche and he's rubbing his eyes now, pinching the bridge of his nose as Sam eyes him from behind his stack of books.

"You want to switch?" asks Sam.

"No," Dean says flatly.

"Coffee break?" Sam offers.

He doesn't even answer.

Sam wonders if it's just his imagination, or if Dean's looking a little pale.

Dean finally hits the end of the roll and drags himself to his feet. He starts to stretch, but then a stunned look comes over him, and he drops his hands to his neck and grunts.

"Sore?" But Sam can already see it's more than that, because Dean is lowering himself back into the chair and is bending forward, putting his head between his knees.

"Hey." Sam's on his feet, coming around the table to settle a practiced hand on Dean's shoulder, then squeezing the back of his neck, which is pronouncedly warmer than it should be. "Come on, deep breaths."

The person running the microfiche room leans in through the door and gives them a long look.

"We're fine," Sam reassures her, smiling wide. "We were just leaving."

"Oof," Dean objects as Sam pulls him to his feet, drapes Dean's arm around his shoulders. Dean's white as a sheet, his free hand hovering near his head. Sam slips his palm in past it and feels his forehead.

"Ouch," Sam murmurs.

Bacterial meningitis. Six days in the hospital.

---

"Didn't we get immunized for meningitis?"

Dean's hair is sticking straight up at the back. He frowns dopily, scratches the arm with the IV in it. "Yeah. We did."

"Huh." Sam reaches out unconsciously and stills his hand.

---

Dean gets all his shots again, right there in the hospital, one after another. His expression is guarded, brows knit as he alternates between scrutinizing the proceedings with professional disdain and queasily averting his eyes. Sam paces at the foot of the bed, Dean's guard dog, ready to intervene.

Somewhere amid the swabbing and pricking and taping, Dean sneezes.

Sam stares.

Dean meets his eyes and quickly looks away.

He sneezes again as the doctor's packing up. "Bless you," she says on her way out, and then they're alone, except for Dean's roommate in the other bed but he's pretty out of it.

Sam laces his fingers on top of his head, lets his elbows dangle. "Dean... are you getting sick? Again?"

Dean's poker face slides into sheepish misery. "There was this kid," he begins.

---

end


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